Internet Staffing Methods Compared to Traditional Staffing Methods: Time, Cost, Quality, and Retention

Internet Staffing Methods Compared to Traditional Staffing Methods: Time, Cost, Quality, and Retention

Introduction

The advancement in technology over a short span of having the considerably changed the mean of conducting business and this increase in utilization and dependence on technology is significantly vigilant over the increasing number of individuals and organization using the Internet for their day to day communication. The effect of technology on business operations and business is evident in the ongoing research and literature identifying and exploring the effects of development of technology and its implementation of the efficiency of business, along with its impact on practices of human resource (Cullen, 2001). The organization has adopted Web as a medium faster than any other medium in history. This is evident by the fact that radio took 30 years for reaching 50 million users, whereas, the internet was reached in the period of just five years to 50 million users (Kerschbaumer, 2000).

In the case of human resource management, the internet has changed the meaning of recruitment from the point of view of both a job seeker and an organization (Epstein & Singh, 2003). The traditional process of recruitment is accredited as being lengthy hiring cycle times making it time consuming, less geographical reach, and high costs per process. However, the introduction of the internet and its rapid growth into the processes of recruitment can chiefly be acknowledged to the unrivaled capabilities of communication of the internet, which facilitates in transmission of documents, e-mails, and other form of written communication within seconds; accessing websites of individuals or organization with just a click of a mouse; and conducting conversations of real time that are printed, visual, and audio instantly. This form of communication is easy, quick, and cheap having a greater reach locally, nationally, and internationally.

Discussion

Internet staffing is also known as E-recruitment, cyber-recruiting, internet recruiting or online recruitment in literature, where refers to the practice of online advertisement of job vacancies and the formal source of informing regarding vacancies online. At the same time, internet staffing is considered as rather a new concept by many organizations, whereas articles related to internet staffing first appeared in the mid of 1980s. Conversely, it was almost a decade later in the mid of 1990s that scrupulous and systematic research and articles were appearing to be published in journals of human resource regarding internet staffing.

It is documented that 75% professionals of Human resource in developed countries utilize a method of internet recruitment in congruence with the traditional methods like employee referrals and advertisement in newspaper. It is estimated that one among four job seekers uses the internet as a source for job opportunities. Evidences have been found of increasing use and dependency of internet staffing in a study undertaken by Lee (2005) who reported that Fortune 100 companies listed in 2003 Fortune magazine were utilizing the internet for advertising vacant positions in their organizations.

The internet is gaining popularity as a source ...